Drought Assessment Information
What is a drought assessment information report?
The Drought Assessment Information report is a multi-map report for a specific shire or regional council as a PDF document, emailed to you.
The report is produced by the AussieGRASS model via the FORAGE system; it includes rainfall, pasture growth, potential flow to stream, total standing dry matter (biomass) and a curing index for different time periods to assist with drought assessment.
What is included in this report?
The report provides over 20 maps showing rainfall, pasture growth, potential flow to stream, total standing dry matter (biomass) and a curing index for a selected shire in Queensland to assist with drought assessment.
The maps are produced by the AussieGRASS model, a spatial implementation of Queensland Government’s GRASP (Grass Production) model. Within the AussieGRASS framework, GRASP is run daily on a 5km x 5km grid across the nation. The AussieGRASS spatial framework includes inputs of key climate variables (rainfall, evaporation, temperature, vapour pressure and solar radiation), soil and pasture types, tree and shrub cover, domestic livestock and other herbivore numbers.
AussieGRASS was developed in the early 1990s to monitor, at regional scales (e.g. local government areas or bioregions), key biophysical processes associated with drought, pasture degradation and recovery.
With respect to drought assessment, the system goes beyond the analysis of rainfall alone, allowing assessment of the impacts of rainfall on components of the grazing system–in particular pasture growth.
Report sample
Report sample is available online here .
Subscription option
Periodic subscriptions (1, 2 or 3 months) are available for this report. See here for more information on how to subscribe and unsubscribe.
